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RIGHT OF SECESSION-THE IMPENDING^CRISIS. 



SPEECH 



WILLIAM S. HOLMAN, 



OF INDIANA, 



,. ^ THE. STATE OF THE UNION, 



DILITEBID ta 



THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, JANUARY 16, 1881. 



WASHINGTON : 

M'QIU* * WITHEROW, PEINTER«. 
1861. 



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SPEECH 



The House being in the Committee of the Whole on the Army Bill — 

Mr. HOLMAN said : 

Mr. Chairman: The fact can no longer be concealed, sir, that 
we are in the midst of revolution. The American people are com- 
pelled to behold a spectacle which, in the confidence of long years 
of peaceful security, they have deemed to be impossible — the Union, 
established by the sacrifices of their fathers, and sanctified by im- 
perishable memories, quivering in the very agony of dissolution ! 
Who, sir, can stand unappalled in contemplation of the fact? Who 
can but regret that he is a part of the generation which, while 
bearing onward the flag of the Republic, seduoed by the unworthy 
passions of the hour, has suffered its sacred folds to be trampled 
in the dust ? I will not discuss, sir, the merits of the questions 
which have given rise to this alarming condition of public affairs, 
or indulge in crimination upon the North or the South. These, 
sir, are swallowed up for the time by the graver question, whether 
the Government itself shall continue to exist ; whether the Consti- 
tution by which it is created possesses the inherent power to resist 
its own destruction. 

If, sir, a State possesses the right of secession; if the strength 
of the Government is founded only on the voluntary concert of its 
various parts ; if any part of the nation can withdraw from the 
common Confederacy at pleasure, without reference to the irrepar- 
able injustice that may result to the other parts of the Confederacy ; 
then, sir, is ours the weakest Government on the face of the earth ; 
the prosperity of its people at the mercy of every storm of human 
passion ; its apparent greatness a miserable delusion, as baseless as 
the fabric of a dream. 

It is urged, sir, that if a State does actually secede from the 
Union, the question whether the right exists, or whether it be an 
act of revolution, or an exercise of power without right, is wholly 
immaterial ; that the consequences are the same. The proposition 
is not true. If the right exists, the remaining States must acqui- 
esce, whatever may be the consequences to their material interest. 
If it does not, they may determine, without aggression, what policy 
may be necessary to vindicate their own rights against the conse- 
quences of the act of the seceding State.* But beyond this, sir, 
there are tribunals to which States and nations are responsible. 



The question whether the overthrow of this Government, by an act 
of secession, be in conformity with the compact by which it was 
founded, or an act of unwarrantable violence, in derogation of 
public faith, may determine the judgment which the civilized nations 
of the earth, and the friends of freedom throughout the world, 
may pronounce upon the act of its destruction. But above all, sir, 
it will determine the judgment of that tribunal from which no State 
nor generation of men can escape — the impartial judgment of pos- 
terity. If this Republic is to perish, and furnish another argument 
for kings and consolidated power ; if the proud expectations of the 
illustrious men who formed it are to be disappointed ; if the Gov- 
ernment which is at once the hope and the pride and the glory of 
down-trodden millions is to become another mockery of human 
aspirations ; if the ark of the covenant of our fathers, with the 
visible evidence of the approbation of Almighty God still resting 
upon it, is to be dashed to pieces, let that final tribunal determine 
the character of the act, and denounce the sentence of its vindictive 
wrath upon the memory of the guilty. In the midst, sir, of the 
horrors of national ruin, if they shall come upon us, the question 
whether they have resulted from an exercise of rightful power or 
from violated faith will not fail to enter into the judgment which 
even the present generation will pronounce, 
^z:^ I deny, sir, the right of a State to secede from this Union. The 
'whole history of the country, from the first suggestion of a union 
among the American colonies to the present hour, disproves it. It 
is disproved by the Articles of Confederation and the events which 
led to the organization of the Government ; by the history of the 
present Constitution, and the opinions of the great statesmen who 
formed it ; and, above all, by the very terms of the Constitution 
itself. The Union formed by the Articles of Confederation was in 
the nature of a compact or league between States. It was a Con- 
federacy of the States. It did not sufficiently unite the American 
people as one nation. The federal authority was insufficient. And, 
•although it was declared to be " a perpetual Union" between the 
enumerated States, our fathers,^ to form "a more perfect Union," 
and give strength and efficiency to their Government, ordained the 
present Constitution, founding its authority, not upon a compact 
or league between States, but upon the original source of political 
power; not upon the sovereignty of States, but upon the original 
sovereignty of the people: ., - ; 

•'We, the people of *e United States,- in otder to form a more perfect Union, 

establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, 

promote the general welfare, and aepure the blessings of liberty to ourseilyes and 

:,our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for. the United States of 

■-'Ahierica." .-■- ■<■■.■ ,-j:-;'^:j'i^ij',... ..;. ^- -,;• :,,- ■.■■c;h:, :' 

.«» ■ 

The form of ratification cannot change its character. The peoplo 
themselves, through their agents and representatives, declared it to 



be their owti act, not as the people of separate and independent 
States, but as the people of the United States of America. The 
political history of the world, sir, does not furnish an example of 
a more explicit exercise of sovereign power in organizing its ele- 
ments into one indissoluble nation. The authority, then, on which 
the Government of the United States rests, is exactly the same 
on which the governments of the States are founded ; both are equally 
created by the people, by the exercise of their original sovereignty. 
, Certain powers are invested in the one government, and certain 
powers are delegated to the other, and each are equally sovereign 
within the limits of the powers conferred. The people of the sev- 
eral States are not more united for the purposes of domestic gov- 
ernment, than the people of the whole nation are for the purposes 
of national government. While jealous of their reserved rights, the 
people declared the Government of the United States, as to the 
powers conferred upon it, to be the supreme government. To it 
was confided the power to provide for the common defence and the 
general welfare of the whole nation ; and the Constitution thus 
created, and the laws and treaties which should be made in pur- 
suance with its authority, were declared to be the supreme law of 
the land. But the powers not delegated were reserved to the 
States or the people. But, sir, was the power reserved to the people 
of any State to detsroy the Government ? To annul the powers 
necessary to the well being and common defence of all the contracting 
parties ? To withdraw their consent that the common Constitution, 
and the laws made under it, should be the supreme law, not of one 
State, or a part of the States, but of all the States? No, sir; such 
a reservation would have been utterly inconsistent with the whole 
instrument. The wise statesmen of the day, forming a Govern- 
ment which they trusted would endure through all time, would 
never have placed it at the mercy of every wave of human passion. 
The whole Constitution, from its title to the last section of its 
amendments, bristles with denials of this " colossal heresy" — the 
right of a part of the people who made the Constitution to destroy 
it. No, sir ; all of the States together, except so far as they may 
represent the sovereignty of the whole people, could not annul the 
binding force of the Constitution. ^'I'^-- t*^i 

To present the evidence, sir, that the right of secession is in con- 
flict with the opinions of the men who formed the Government, 
would be to present almost the entire history of the Constitution. 
I content myself with the authority of a few of the most illustrious 
men, whose names have become household words, and whose statues 
decorate your Capitol. 

In the ever-memorable farewell address of the Father of his 
Country, it is said : 

"The basis of our political system is, the right of the people to make and alter 
their constitutions of g(Jlernment. But the Constitution which at any time exists, 
until'changed by the explicit and authentic act of the whol« people, is sacredly 
obligatory upon alL" 



Mr. Madison, in his letter to Mr. Trist, on the 28d day of De- 
cember, 1832, said : 

" It is remarkable how closely the nullifiers, who make the name of Mr. Jeffer- 
son the pedestal for their colossal heresy, shut their eyes and lips whenever his 
authority is ever so clearly and emphatically against them. You have noticed 
what he says in his letters to Monroe and Carrington (pp. 43, 293, vol. -) with 
respect to the power of the old Congress to coerce delinquent States ; and his rea- 
sons for preferring for the purpose a naval to a military force ; and, moreover, 
his remark that it was not necessary to find a right to coerce in the Federal arii- 
cles, that being inherent in the nature of a compact. It is high time that the 
claim to s,9cede at will fchould be put down by the public opinion." 

Mr. Piuckney, of South Carolina, in the convention that framed 
the Constitution, said : 

" I apprehend that the true intention of the States in uniting is, to have a firm 
national Government, capable of effectually executing its acts and dispensing the 
benefits of its protection. In it alone can be vested those powers and prerogatives 
which more particularly distinguish a sovereign State." 

President Jackson, in his celebrated proclamation, said : 

"It [the General Government] is a Government in which all of the people are 
represented, which operates directly on the people individually, not upon the 
State. They retain all the powers they did not grant. But each State having ex- 
pressly parted with so many powers as to constitute jointly with the other States 
a single nation, cannot, from that period, pass any right to secede, because such 
secession does not break a league, but destroys the unity of a nation." 

But if, in defiance of right, by a violation of public faith, on 
pretence of intolerable oppression — for the remedy of which no ap- 
peal has been made to the national Congress, to the Federal judi- 
ciary, to the States, or the people of the States — a State, upon her 
own responsibility, does secede from the Union, what, sir, is the 
remedy ? 31i/ answer is, sir, the constitutional enforcement of the 
laws. The General Government, charged with the duty of pro- 
viding for the general welfare, cannot shrink from the responsi- 
bility of preventing the act of secession from impairing the just 
rights i^f the remaining States. As the agent of the whole people, 
it may ?iot hesitate in the performance of its duty. It cannot abdi- 
cate G-overnment. It cannot abandon the trust it has accepted. 

But how shall the rights of the remaining States be vindicated ? 
By levying war on the seceding States ? No, sir. The people 
have not invested the Federal Government with power to recognize 
the right of secession. As to the General Government, the act of 
attempted secession is a mere nullity. The Government cannot 
wage war upon one of its parts ; but it must execute the laws, so 
far as their execution involves the interests of the whole people. 
But gentlemen say that this is coercion. What is meant, sir, by 
coercion ? If you mean by it that, if a State shall refuse to per- 
form those duties which, in the very nature of things, must be the 
result of voluntary action, and which moral .obligation can alone 
enforce, the Government of the United States, ly the army or navy, 
shall compel their observance — then, sir, am I against^ coercion. 



If you mean, sir, that the mailed hand of the Government shall be 
laid upon a State to compel her, as the only escape from violence, 
to elect members of Congress, her citizens to perform the offices of 
judges of the Federal courts and the duties of jurors, to act as 
collectors of the revenue and postmasters — then, sir, I am against 
coercion. These are duties which even tyranny cannot enforce ; 
and their performance, however desirable, is not indispensable to 
the general welfare of the Union. If a State abandons the benefits 
of the Union, so far as the act affects herself only, no one may 
complain. But if you mean, sir, by coercion, the enforcement of » 
the laws necessary to the welfare of the whole Union — laws enacted f 
by the authority founded on the original sovereignty, and involving 
the constitutional rights of the whole people of the United States ; 
if you mean, sir, by coercion, the constitutional enforcement of 
these laws as they have been from the beginning — then, sir, I am 
in favor of coercion. If you mean, sir, by coercion, the collection 
of the public revenues as they have been collected for three-quarters 
of a century, and which are necessary to the very existence of the 
nation, or the protection of property purchased by the common 
treasure anrl for the general benefit of the whole people of the 
United States ; if these, sir, are acts of coercion, then I am for 
coercion ; and the right and duty of such coercion by the General 
Government, by the exercise of all of its constitutional powers, no 
State, however blinded by the passions of the hour, can deny. 

But these, sir, are not in strictness acts of coercion, but the 
ordinary enforcement of the laws by the agencies agreed upon by 
the common consent of the whole people in the formation of the 
Confederacy. 

The sufficiency of the powers conferred by the people on the 
General Government for maintaining the majesty of the law, can- 
not be called in question. It is not so much a power conferred as 
a duty imposed. "■ The Congress shall have power to lay and col- 
lect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts and provide 
for the common defence and general welfare of the United States ;" 
and the President, representing the executive power of the whole 
people, and solemnly sworn to preserve, protect, and defend the 
Constitution of the United States, is enjoined " to take care that 
the laws be faithfully executed ;" and, sir, he cannot shrink from 
the duty nor abdicate the power. 

But how does the question stand upon authority ? I have already 
presented the opinion of Mr. Madison on the power of coercion 
and confirming the views of Mr. Jefferson. Mr. Jefferson, in one 
of the letters referred to, said, as a reason for providing a navy to 
coerce the Barbary States : 

"It, will arm the Federal head (the old Congress) with the safest of alMnstrti- 
tneM8 of coercion over its delinquent members, and prevent its "«°g ;;]'»*7j.^i; 
be less safe." [ManiHstly referring to military force. ]-^e/«r«on'« letter to John 
Adanu, July 11, 1785. 



8' 

"It will be said there is no money in the Treasury. Therr never >ill be moiiey j 
in the Treasury until the Confederacy shows its teeth. Every Tf^t-ionaljqitizen must 
wish to see an effective instrument of coercion, and should fear to ;see it onapy 
other' element than tlie water. A naval force can never etadang^r our liberties Wdr' 
occasion bloodshed; a land force would do both."— Jefferson'\r,leiter -to Col.iMonmfij 

August 11, 11 8&. •^I; ::"--:{^1"-ii Uyfij I'i::: 

Again:- . rr '^. .. 

iL"Ithas been so often said, as to be generally, believed, that, pcngres9;.h^8 no 
0;wer by the Confederation to enforce anything; for example :' contributions of 
money. It was not necessary to give them that power expreasl^y ; tJb^yihave'it by ■' 
the Liw of nature."— Jf^«rso«'s letter to Carringlon, August 4. 1787.' M)(!u,.ii :j:. -,•• 

To whose opinions,, sir, ' can tKe; American ' jpfebple ' appeal with 
more confidence on ^ such a'questibn ks this thjltitJp those of the 
statesmen who, of all others, gave' form and. clikratcf/erio'thiB Con- 
stitution, and were aljke enemies of cohsplidat^d'"'JM^i:, |and^ the 
sleepless friends of the reserved rights. '' '''::''"7'^'^ '"'■- '1 ' '^^ ' 

But I present another authority, sir, which even the people of. 
South Carolina may not refuse to hear; a stalesmai^ whose devo- 
tion to South Carolina was only surpassed bv/hi^. love. o.f. justice 
and attachment to the American Union— f\. mail,, sir, who as' a 
patriot, statesman, citizen, and scholar, was an hprioi- to the race.. 
At the nullification ppriod of 1832, he wasy I believe, a member of 
the Legislature of South Carolina. I present a pari of his| address 
to the people of that State «n the subject of secession, not as .an 
authority only, but on account of the vigor of the'sireumeht': ' ' 

"Suffer not yourselves to be deceived by the idea that the Genera-]) fGHavfenSmeii 
will recogniz^ your title to be out of tbe^ Union., . It is iPfsrfectlj^.e.UM'ffJiey caalDot. 
They have no authority to abandon any portion of the, Uniori: T^he -Ti-friiory of 
Carolina was committed to the<r jurisdiction by a jdiiii; iife'tidii-6f''t_i)'e'^infei<;' arid 
nothing short of the absolute necessity imposed by an unsiuccqasful itrai- Cfln'Wlease 
them from the obligations of that trust. They are comtt'auded Abt^, ^i^ippweved to 
make all laws necessary and proper to protect the custom-houtie aijd.ilie post office, 
their courts and julges, and all their officers Can you dpubt tha* ttt'j wiiVdo it.? 
They must treat Carolina as in the Union, whate^Vfer sheTflay'baj'txJithettoittKTiry'j'! 

"If a State employs a power which is revolutionary ais to t^^e Uplbn^ , ;a,nd,i qf 
course, belligerent in its character, the Union must possegt and will txercise a 
corresponding right of retaliation. Are you in the Union?',' Block.lde is, then., R 
clear exercise of the power to collect the revenue. Arfe yba out ^of'i the Union t 
Then in the exercise of an undoubted power to compel thd robseryiace of ,a treaty 
broken by yoursetves. But Congress will not i-egard it as a ; belligerent measure 
whjitever you may say on tiie subject. They must consider it nothing more ^han 
the ordinary case of the President, as commander-in-chief «)f the -Army and Navy 
of the Union, etnploying the latter in the discharge of his dutyiito- 'take xjare that 
the laws be faithfully executed.' " — Oriiiike's letter to the people.of-.Sauth Carqlma, 
December I, 1833.- . j,-<lMa ,:• nD t.n^, 

Sir, the right of secession does not exist. The duty bf enforcing 
the laws is imperative. If the sacrifices of our fathers shajl be 
found useless; if the Union of the States, which was fir^a^d! by their 
wisdom, preserved by their fraternal forbearatce^^ 4nd •defended 
with their blood, shall become a mockery to theit* h'OjiesV"^' dfshbn- 



ored monument to their memory, and a stigma and reproach to 
their children, the imperfect judgment of the present generation, 
arid the severe and unerring judgment of posterity, will not suffer 
the plea of right to palliate the crime of its destruction, and will 
brand this Government with the infamy of broken faith, if it shall, 
in the hour of peril, abandon the sacred trust committed to its 
keeping by the American people. 

But while, sir, there is no right of secession, and although the 
people have imposed upon this Government the duty of enforcing 
the laws, no American statesman will question the right of revolu- 
tion as a remedy for intolerable ojjpression. Can any State of this 
Union present a case, she herself being the judge, that will justify 
a resort to this final remedy ? From what Government would she 
revolt? Certainly not from the government of the States; for each, 
as to local government, is independent. Revolution, then, could 
only be the overturning of the Government of the United States. 
Can any State assert that that Government has been oppressive? 
The gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Anderson] discussed this sub- 
ject yesterday. What showing, sir, did he make against the Gov- 
ernment? Its powers are wisely divided into three departments. 
Which of these departments, sir, has oppressed a State of the 
South ? The judicial ? Why, even the gentleman himself eulogized 
that department as eminently wise and just and impartial. The 
legislative f No State has sought to impeach it. i^'rom the begin- 
ning, no law has been enacted to which the South has not given her 
assent. The executive ? No State of the South will charge it with 
one act of oppression. Where, then, sir, is the right of revolution ? 
The popular voice is unfriendly to the South. Why, sir, in the recent 
expression, a majority'of a million of voices, even by the gentle- 
man's admission, were raised in defence of her constitutional rights. 
But the policy of sister States has been unconstitutional and unjust. 
The majority ? No, the minority; for every southern State ad- 
mits that the fifteen States rf the South and four States of the 
North have been true to tneir engagements. No, sir ; it comes to 
this: that, by the constitutional action of the people, one of three 
departments will be controlled by a policy unfriendly to the South ; 
and that, too, will be controlled by the others, against which the 
South raises no complaint. No, sir ; at the bar of impartial public 
judgment, the case would utterly fail. The Government has been 
eminently wise and patriotic and just. And such will be the 
judgment of history. The opinions of a minority of the Ameri- 
can people are unfriendly to the domestic policy of the South. 
This is unwise and illiberal, but is it intolerable oppression ? No, 
sir ; the right of secession is denied by the Constitution ; and there 
is no oppression to justify the right of revolution. If the Govern- 
ment is overturned, the act will be without justification or excuse. 
The evils that exist— f/?^ want of fraternal comity between the two 
sections bftJie^ Union— admits of remedy without invoking the pres- 



10 

enee of the destroying angel, and calling down the Divine vengeanc4 
upon our heads. 

But, sir, are not States amenable at the bar of public justice? 
For eighty-two years the people of the United States, in the appli- 
cation of the public revenues, have acted on the theory that they 
were one people, and that any tax levied upon the common industry 
of the nation was imposed for the common good, and not for the 
benefit of particular States. Uncounted millions have been levied 
upon the labor of the American peojde, and cheerfully paid, to pro- 
vide for the common defence and general welfare of the whole 
country. For the benefit of the general commerce, light-houses 
have been erected on every coast. To protect the Republic from 
invasion, forts have been built at (^very exposed point upon our 
borders, not for the protection of one State, but of all the States. 
Is it possible, sir, that any part of the American people will coa- 
sider it consistent with good faith and national honor, that these 
results of national industry shall be appropriated to the exclusive 
use' of particular States ? Sir, every citizen of your teeming mil- 
lions, wherever he may have been — in your marts of commerce 
upon the borders of the oceans, or in the secure and peaceful val- 
leys of the distant West, upon your ships in remote seas, or in the 
huts of the trapper in the gorges of your mountains, on the borders 
of the Rio Grande, or by the lakes of the North — wherever he may 
have been, or whatever his pursuits, he felt that the honor, the 
well-being, and the defence of the nation, was his care. What citi- 
zen, sir, has not contributed to the building of your light-houses 
and navy-yards and arsenals and dock-yards and forts, and pro- 
viding munitions of war ? These works, sir, for the national wel- 
fare and defence, have been erected wherever the common interests 
of the nation required them, upon the ocean or upon soil voluntarily 
surrendered to the Government in New York and Massachusetts,! 
Virginia and South Carolina, and elsewhere, not for any particular! 
State or for its benefit, but for the wliole American people. I ask 
again, sir, can any State, without a flagrant violation of good faith, 
appropriate the common industry of the nation to her own exclusive 
use ? 

The great West, with her industrious and peaceful people, de-> 
voted to agriculture, and deriving no direct benefits from duties on 
foreign commerce, receiving no other benefits from the tax on her 
labor, save protection from foreign invasion, has cheerfully con 
tributed millions to erect works of national defence on the coast oi 
the Atlantic ; can any State think so meanly of the manhood of heii 
people as to suppose she will tamely submit to the appropriation ol 
these works by particular States ? The defence of New York anc 
Charleston, of Boston and Savannah, has been the common care o 
the nation. We have removed 'mountains of granite from Neu 
England to the port of Charleston to erect barriers against a comi^ 
mon enemy. The common toil of the American people, in the con 



11 

fidence of national faith, have made the coast of South Carolina to 
frown defiance on the enemies of the Republic. Can these cities 
entertain the belief that other portions of our people can consent 
to their assertion of exclusive ownership of these works in deroga- 
tion of the common right? Can South Carolina, whose chivalrous 
sons are sensitively alive to everything that pertains to their own 
honor, or the horiorof their State, consider it possible that the other 
States of the Union, whose sons are equally sensitive of honor, 
equally brave and chivalrous, can submit to the startling wrong of 
her appropriating to her exclusive use the works of national defence 
upon her borders as though they were the work of her own hands ? 
Can she think so poorly of American spirit and of the national 
sense of honor ? SiR, they will not — they cannot submit to it 
consistently with honor or justice. These works were not built for 
South Carolina, or for her exclusive defence. Congress, even ac- 
cording to the doctrine of her own statesmen, never possessed the 
power of appropriating one dollar of the national treasure except 
for national objects. 

> The attempt to seize upon these works is an act of war ; they 
were erected by the common consent of the nation, with the com- 
mon tieubure of the nation, iu. the faith of the national integrity, 
and for national defence ; and, sir, the honor of the nation is in- 
volved in their appropriation to the purpose for which they were 
designed. That honor, sir, will not be sullied. Yet, while it is a 
goodly thing to have a giant's strength, it is tyrannous to use it like 
a giant. The very strength of the Government will induce for- 
bearance. It is inconsistent with the spirit of the nation to treat 
a State, a member of the political household, however hostile her 
attitude may be, as a revolted province. South Carolina and her 
sister States, who have resorted to this extraordinary method of 
redressing alleged grievances, will be wooed back into the sister- 
hood of States, even in the spirit of maternal kindness — a spectacle 
unheard of in the history of the Morld. But let her and them be- 
ware ! the common mother is not the less powerful because she is 
tender and pacific and forbearing. Let them not provoke the ter- 
rors of the parent's wrath. The forbearance of this Government 
will correspond Avith its irresistible strength. The honor of the na- 
tion is deaj- to every patriot's heart ; the flag of the Republic is 
Hucred. Can South Carolina and her confederate States believe 
that the sense of honor has died out in the hearts of the American 
people ; that manhood and manly courage, and the sentiment of 
justice exist no more in their sister States? South Carolina may 
insult the honor of the nation ; she may seize upon the public prop- 
erty ; she may strike down and trample upon the ensign of the Re- 
public — an act which, if done by the combined and countless mil- 
lions of Europe, armed to the teeth, would be resented upon the in- 
stant, even if it involved every farm-house and hamlet and village 
and town and city in this broad land in indiscriminate ruin — yet 

i 



12 

the nation will bear all this, for the Marions and the Sumters and 
the Rutledtres and the Pinckneys were sons of South Carolina ; and 
it may be that that flag which she has loved so tenderly, and which 
her chivalrous sons have borne so bravely on many a field red with 
the blood of the enemies of the Republic, may, when the passion of 
the hour subsides, become again dear to her heart. Bui let her 
remember that her sentiments of honor and justice and courage are 
the common sentiments of the American people ; let her not remain 
estranged from the heart of her country until she shall cease to be 
embraced by her sympathies ; for no terrors, sir, can equal the 
terrors of a parent's wrath. 

Sir, the questions of this hour are of fearful importance to the 
brave'yet industrious and peaceful people whom in part I have, as 
you have, sir, the honor to represent — the people who have estab- 
lished an empire in the great Northwest. In the disruption of the 
Union, if such a terrible calamity should come upon us, the imme- 
diate interests of our industry are peculiarly involved. We, of all 
others, sir, cannot consent to the dissolution of the Union. Let the 
South and the North remember, sir, that our highways to the Gulf 
and to the ocean cannot be obstructed. The energy and fortitude, 
and courage and enterprise which have established that empire, 
will never consent that tribute' shall be laid upon their labor. What- 
ever misfortunes may befell us, I trust, sir, that that never will be 
attempted ; but if it should be, the mighty flood of the Father of 
Waters is not more resistless than would be the aroused spirit of 
our people. 

I speak the more freely, sir, on these subjects, because I am one 
of the million and a half of men in the free States, who have de- 
fended and will still defend the constitutional rights of our fellow- 
citizens of the South, many of whom seem now willing to desert us 
to the tender mercies of our common political opponents ; and be- 
cause, sir, if some of the States of the North have reversed the 
teachings of our fathers, and adopted a policy destructive of a just 
and fraternal comity betwe,en the States, and have inaugurated, as 
is asserted by the South, the present perils, and furnished at least 
a pretext, if it were possible, for extenuating the crime of national 
destruction, the State of Indiana, which I in part represent, is not 
a party to the offence. Her fertile soil, the gift of Virginia to the 
Union, herself a child of that Union, she has never wavered in her 
devotion to the Constitution and the Union of the States. Her 
statute-books have never been dishonored by an act of nullification, 
nor her people by resistance to the enforcement of the laws. By 
the beautiful river on her southern border, she is indissolubly united 
with Virginia and Pennsylvania and Kentucky and Ohio and 
Illinois and the great States upon the borders of the Mississippi, 
and no State or citizen of a State can charge her with an act of 
violated faith. She is devoted to the Union, not only because of 
its illustrious memories and countless blessings, but by the ties of 



IS 

kindred and of blood. Her children must go to the valleys of Vir- 
ginia and the coasts of Maryland, to Kentucky and Tennessee and 
the Carolinas, to the hills of New Englantl and the shores of the 
Hudson and the Delaware, to visit the graves of their fathers and 
the homes of their childhood. She has received no more material 
aid from the Union, save protection to the peaceful industry of her 
citizens. With near a million and a half of people, she has neither 
dock-yard, nor navy yard, nor arsenal, nor fort ; the General Gov- 
ernment has scarcely furnished her a stand of arms. She has been 
content that her defences should be the defences of the nation. 
For fifty years her people have cheerfully borne every burden 
which the wisdom of the General Government has thought fit to 
impose upon them, in peace and in war, and millions upon millionsj 
of treasure coined from the sweat of their industry have poured 
into the common Treasury of the Republic, for the general wel- 
fare and common defence. She has kept her faith; she has broken 
no covenant ; and with clean hands she will resist the breaking of 
the most sacred covenant ever sanctioned by mortals — the covenant 
sealed with the blood of our fathers — the compact of the Union. 

For myself, sir, as a Democrat, while I have resisted and de- 
plored the sectional policy of the dominant party of the North, 
and warned our people of its danger, I have not been able to forget, 
sir, that the spirit of the northern Democracy was crushed and 
stricken down by a corresponding policy of the dominant party of 
the South ; the partial success of the Republican party, upon which 
is predicated this suicidal policy of secession, is attribuable to the 
feuds in the ranks of the hitherto indomitable Democracy ; yet I 
see, sir, in the election of Abraham Lincoln to the Presidency, 
however much to be deplored, nothing to justify this extraordinary 
■ remedy. Who could have imagined, sir, that in a free Government, 
where diversities of opinion are inevitable, the election of a Chief 
Magistrate peacefully and by a constitutional majority, and before 
any act is committed or policy is announced, however illiberal and 
unjust the principles by which the^ election was controlled might 
be, .■should furnish an excuse for at once overturning the Govern- 
ment, and that Government still the best, sir, infinitely, infinitely 
the best, upon which the beneficent smiles of the Father of mankind 
have ever rested? If it were possible, sir, to look at the question 
in a mere partisan light, I should complain with bitterness that our 
Bouthern brethren, by whom we have stood so long and so faithfully, 
desert us, even while we still control the policy of the Government, 
while no act of the nation is the subject of complaint, and leave us 
to fight our battles alone. 

But, sir, why this precipitancy ? Will our brethren of the South 
destroy the Government and involve us all in indiscriminate ruin, 
without even giving us an opportunity to consider the evils of which 
they complain ? Aie they less interested in its permanency than 
•ux8«lv«a? For myself, 8ir» I will sacrifice any pride of opinion 



14 

to save the Union. I should reluctantly touch the Constitution — 
the work of the grand old master-workmen. I should reluctantly 
impose restrictions on popular freedom in the Territories. I would 
consent to it, but only to save the Confederacy. What sacrifice 
would I not make to save it ? 

When I have stood, sir, upon one of those beautiful hills that 
overhang the waters of the Ohio, and have taken in at a glance 
the distant hills of Kentucky and Ohio, and of my own native 
State, descending in fertile valleys to the verge of that noble river ; 
and further off", the waters of the Miami disappearing in the dis- 
tance, and the whole scene covered with farm-hoiases and cornfields 
and green meadows and vineyards and rising villages and prosper- 
ous towns ; while the tones of cheerful labor, in a thousand voices, 
swelled up and mingled together, and God's blessed sunlight gilded 
the whole landscape, I have thought of the darkness and agony of 
that hour when the storm which our unhallowed passions have been 
arousing should sweep over the glorious prospect, a messenger of 
ruin ; when the sounds of industry and the cheerful voices of 
childhood should no longer float on the river, or its waves bear 
southward the fruits of the labor of many prosperous States ; but 
armed men should march upon its desolated borders, the sounds of 
war should float upon its waves, reddening with fraternal blood ; 
and its bosom, instead of the peaceful keel, should bear the muni- 
tions of war, and the labor and hopes of years become the prey of 
the spoiler. And I have felt, sir, in my very soul, the value of 
this peaceful Union, and that that man who should contribute to 
its destruction would be, of all mortals, from the flood to the final 
fire, in the sight of God the most guilty. 

I can speak for the patriotism of my immediate constituents ; and 
I believe, sir, that I am able to express the sentiments of the State 
of Indiana. I believe, sir, she would cheerfully sanction, as a 
measure of peace, the propositions of Judge Douglas, or those sub- 
mitted to the country by the committee of the border States ; and I 
have every reason to believe tjiat an overwhelming majority of her 
people would sustain the propositions submitted to the Senate by 
the Senator from Kentucky, whose venerable years unite the past 
glories of the Republic with its present dishonor. She does^not 
expect, sir, that this great Republic can be preserved, except by 
the exercise of the justice and wisdom and forbearance in which it 
■was formed. She remembers, sir, that the dominant section of the 
Union should act wath magnanimity, and that the interests involved 
are too great to justify the mastery of prejudice or passion, or the 
supremacy of the mere pride of opinion. I believe^ sir, that she 
will concede and concede and concede, and compromise and com-pro- 
mise and compromise, to preserve the blessings of a peaceful Union ; 
that she will go to the very verge and utmost boundary of every 
demand which justice may make or honor may grant. She will do 
more, sir. She will entreat and implore her sister States, of the 



15 

North and of the South, by a remembrance of our common origin 
and the ties of our common and kindred blood ; by our common 
memories and our common hopes ; by the graves of our fathers and 
-the cradles of our children ; by the consideration of all that we have 
been, of all that vre are, and of all that we may be as a nation if 
the blessings of the Union shall continue, to forbear from the work 
of destruction. Yet, sir, she will never consent, by her voice, by her 
acts, or by her silence, that this Union shall be destroyed. She will 
stand the more firmly by the altar of the common Union as the 
storms may deepen around it. She will account that hand the hand 
of an enemy that shall be raised to tear down the temple of the 
Constitution. And if, sir, it shall involve her sense of justice and 
honor, and no other sacrifice will avail ; ij it must be, in its defence 
she will command her brave and patriotic sons to dare the peril of 
perishing beneath its ruins. 

But I cannot despair of the Republic. I would still believe, sir, 
and trust in God that the heart of the American people, North and 
South, though filled with the bitterness of passion, is still devoted 
to the Union, and still glories iu the flag of our common country, 
though its stars grow dim in the gathering darkness. I trust — 
though it is hoping against hope — that they will still say to the gal- 
lant ship that was launched by our fathers on the ocean of human 
passions in the midst of so many hopes and fears : 

" Thou, too, sail on, ship of State, 
Sail on ; Union, strong and great, 
Humanity, with all its fears, 
With all the hopes of future years, 
Is hanging breathless- on thy fate, 
In spite of rock and tempest's roar. 
In spite of false lights on tha shore. 
Sail on ; nor fear to breast the sea ; 
Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee; 
Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears. 
Our faith triumphant o'er our fears. 
Are all with thee — are all with thee." 

May the Lord God of our fathers shield the gallant old ship from 
the fierce waves of the impending storm. 



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